


X

by distantdreaming



Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M, Mr. Pickles is a cat, Paranormal, Pretty Boys, Sass, Spirits, and a great ass, pretty boys that are assholes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-03-02
Updated: 2016-03-26
Packaged: 2018-05-24 06:53:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6145236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/distantdreaming/pseuds/distantdreaming
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mal is twenty-two, and spends his life on the run, surviving on credit card fraud and the ability to the ability to bullshit with a straight face. He's a medium in a world where his abilities are illegal, on the pain of imprisonment for life. It's too dangerous to stop, and he knows the people haunted by demons and poltergeists need to be saved, and the government isn't about to be any help. He's gonna continue to do what he does, and try his best not to get caught in the process.<br/>Jade's over 320, frozen in the body of the nineteen-year-old boy he was when he died...only to be brought back by the sacrifice his family made in their last moments. As the last of his line, with a Spark powered by the sacrifice and the lingering bits of his family's Sparks, he is easily one of the most powerful Magic users alive. He doesn't flaunt it, though; even as powerful as he is, he is damaged, having sacrificed part of himself to try and bring back his family and only achieving the revival of his cat. He hides away, scared and ashamed, lost to the sands of time.<br/>Together, they may be able to change the way their world works, or burn to the ground in their attempt to save themselves. First, they should meet.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Introductions

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to my original work! I have yet to work out a title, so for now we'll be going with X. This is the work that is coming from my Patreon, so check that out if you'd like to see more than just the chapters themselves. I hope to continue to post this here, and I would really appreciate the support!

**Malachi**

On November fifteenth, at two forty-eight in the morning, Mal was woken up by the unmistakable sound of the mirror in his bathroom cracking down the middle, but not yet shattering. The chill in the air was a window pushed open, a few scattered leaves blown in from outside resting on the dirty carpet. The moonlight was weak, offering little more than the shape of the bed frame, the only piece of furniture in the room.

He groaned, dropping his arm over his eyes, mourning the loss of his night’s sleep silently for a moment before he hauled himself up and off the bed, padding on bare feet to the bathroom. He flicked on a dim light by the door, squinting tiredly at the crack. It was long, spanning the entire length of the glass, splitting it cleanly down the center. His reflection was distorted, but less by the crack and more by the condensation that coated the surface, coalesced from the light fog that trickled from the bottom of the crack.

“Asshole,” he mumbled, irritable. “Fucking hate paying damages for this kinda shit.” 

The mirror did not reply, or at least not verbally. The fog did grow thicker, though, spilling out a little more sluggishly. He eyed it with nothing short of disgust, flicked the light off, and wandered back to the bed.

“Contact me when you can communicate like an adult, and at a reasonable fucking hour next time!” He called, not bothering to turn and glance back at the sound of another crack. “And quit fucking messing with my mirrors, they’re  _ expensive!” _

* * *

 

**Jade**

Elsewhere, several states and a social class or two away, a kettle hissed on an antique stovetop. 

A short distance away from the stove, Jade was standing at the head of an ornate wooden table, an actual black iron cauldron set up on a freestanding burner in front of him with a purplish, sweetly-scented something boiling away inside. After studying the surface, he pulled away from the liquid, going to the stove to pull the kettle off, turning off the gas, and pouring the water into a mug, also antique. A green tea teabag was added, and he left it alone to steep, going back to the cauldron to poke at the liquid with his bare hand, the symbol drawn on the back of his palm starting to glow a soft bluish white as he did. When he pulled his fingers from the boiling surface, the rune faded away entirely, and his fingers weren’t even pink. 

He leaned down, inhaling the scent, and frowned a little, reaching into one of the dozens of small jars on the shelf next to the table and pulling out a few dried flowers, tossing them into the liquid, where they instantly burst into flames and dissolved. He wasn’t phased, already plucking a few leaves from one of the plants potted on the very top of the shelves, where the light of a skylight window hit them enough to keep them alive. He tossed those into the cauldron as well, adding a few other odd ingredients and not even glancing at the puffs of flame at each new addition. 

When he was satisfied, he pulled a sharpie from his back pocket and redrew the symbol that had been on his hand before, dipping his fingers back into the liquid and stirring, clicking the pen closed. Slowly, the contents went from purplish and sweet to greenish and earthy. This seemed to be what he wanted, because he let the rune fade from his hand and crouched down, pulling a wooden crate of empty mason jars from underneath the table and fishing a ladle out of the bottom of the crate, portioning the thick substance into jars. 


	2. Slow Beginning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Mmmm...I hope this turns out nice.

**Malachi**

The mirror was in no way repairable, and he didn’t bother telling the landlord. He wasn’t going to stay here long, there wasn’t much point. They’ll try to mail him a bill, but his forwarding address is as false as the name he signed the rent lease under. He didn’t stick around anywhere, not for more than a few weeks. Technically speaking, he was homeless, just also very good at credit card fraud and false identities. Give him a laptop, free wifi, a little free time, and a cup of coffee for a new identity and background. Burner phones, fake numbers, an accent or three and he’s untraceable.

He has to be. What he is and what he does is hilariously illegal, and he’s not about to stay in one place and wait to be caught. He knows better than that, was taught better than that. He grew up in an orphanage, grew up with kids that were stripped of families by the very things he fights against. Unfortunately, his method, while much more effective than any government organization or scientific breakthrough, is very, very dangerous. More people died by messing up than anything else in the first few years, so what he does is banned for public safety. It still exists, as do potions for health and herbs grown for spells, because the people aren’t naive enough to think the government has the cure to the problems they face.

So, now it’s all underground; back alley deals and moving under the cover of night, spells by candlelight and speaking only to the right people, because no one wants another disaster like Salem. He gets it, the need for secrecy, he really does, but it’s still unfair for him to have to sacrifice a chance at a decent life so he could preserve it for others. He doesn’t get to form relationships, even as simplistic as an acquaintance, because he won’t be where he is the next week and what’s the point when he’s got to pack his bag and leave in the morning? 

He thinks about the bitter truth as he pushes his clothes into his duffle, the bracelets on his wrist clinking as he does. They’re mostly thread, knotted in patterns, but woven in are crystals and runes carved on metal disc beads. The sound of them is a comfort, because it means he’s safe, that he has protection on him, even if only from the minor things. 

He doesn’t have a Gift, no Spark or Flame to actually use Magic himself, just a silver tongue and a convincing bullshit expression that gets him in the good books of those that do so that he can get the charms made. He’s unfortunately running low on them, because once the protection is activated, the bracelet breaks when it’s no longer needed and the spell expires. He’s only got about half a dozen left, a mix of Anti-Possesion and Strength and Fortitude and such, and he needs to stock up because this next job, a city over, is gonna snap off at least three of the seven he’s currently wearing. 

It’s really a shame the Magic washed out of the tattoos he’d gotten back when he was sixteen, from a pothead Gifted tattoo artist that he lived next door to for a month and a half. They’re beautiful, the runes, but he hasn’t found someone how can juice him up again in years because that kind of thing takes intimacy and time, neither of which he’s prone to giving out. He makes due with bracelets, pendants, and rings now. It’s a good thing he’s a fan of piercings and hair dye and all that, because otherwise the amount of jewelry he wears would look out of place. No one’s going to question the cords disappearing into his collar or the rings on his fingers when he’s got a good ten piercings on his face. They just look away and think about how he’s a hooligan menace to society, and he’s a hundred percent cool with that. 

Purple hair helps further his aesthetic, probably, and he likes the compliments he gets from his colors too much to care if it doesn’t. He’ll happily add regular tattoos to the mix if it means he’ll blend in with the crowd as another punk kid, but he doesn’t have the cash and he doesn’t have the time to deal with the healing process. 

He shakes off the thoughts, zipping the bag closed and hauling it up onto his shoulder. He needs to get downstairs and catch a bus, he’s got a long way to go before he can take another break.

* * *

 

**Jade**

Jade’s concentration shattered when a bird outside let out a squawk. The books floating in the air around him fell towards the floor in a tumble, and it was all he could do to slam his hands out and change the fall to slow motion, letting each book touch down safely. He let his hands fall again once everything was back in the embrace of gravity, sighing and rubbing his eyes, feeling the magic fade away again, trickling out of his veins and back into the Spark. 

Frustrated, he flopped onto his back and groaned, staring up at the ceiling. After a moment, he brought one of his hands above him, staring at the too-pale skin with distaste. Just a moment ago, it had been a normal cream, and his eyes had once again shown bluey green, his hair the deep red he missed; the same eye color his father’s had been, the same blood red his mother’s long hair had been, the freckles they’d all shared. 

Now, without the magic flowing through him and filling him with the Essence he’d lost when he brought Mr. Pickles back to life, he was back to the deathly palor of a corpse, and he wrinkled his nose, grateful at the least that he wasn’t graying at the edges. Small blessings, and all that. He just lost all pigment and got really sensitive skin, eyes, nose, everything out of it. He can deal, though. That’s what charms and runes and spells are for. 

Mr. Pickles must have sensed his mood, because within a minute a warm white weight curled up on his chest, a sandpaper tongue tickling his chin until he laughed and pushed the cat’s pale-eyed face away. “Yeah, yeah. I know. I just...miss it all.”

He got a meow in reply, and he sighed, stroking the cat’s soft white fur. “Do you ever wonder if we could go out and make it in the world today? Or do you think it’s changed too much?”

Mr. Pickles can’t answer him, he knows. He likes to ask questions anyways, because it’s hard not to feel terribly alone when no one knows you exist and the nearest city is a two and a half miles away through dense forest terrain. He’s lived in this house since it was built, and he’ll continue to live in it until it’s no longer standing. He doesn’t have to worry about growing old, because he never will; a Magic gone wrong saved his life when he was nineteen, and that was in 1704. It’s, what, twenty-somethingteen? He’s not really sure. He lost most contact with the outside world about twenty years ago and he’s never bothered to try and truly reconnect. After all, who he is and what he does is  _ not _ accepted, and he’s got over three centuries of history behind him to prove it’s not about to be any different nowadays. 

Well, he’s got social media. There’s been some progress; it’s no longer a crime to like the same sex, and gender rules are no longer so strict, so there’s that. Unfortunately, activism has had no victories for Magic, and Jade’s pretty much made of the stuff. He’s old, he’s got powerful blood running through his veins and he’s the last of his line. With age, he’s mastered most all the elemental strains, and his control has only risen. 

Unfortunately, as of late, he’s having a harder and harder time concentrating. He’s feeling unusually alone more and more often, and he’s...he wants to say it sort of feels like he’s drowning, but that would require him to know how to swim.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really appreciate any and all feedback. I don't think the one-of-each parting of chapter will stay, but yeah. It feels too short to split it up, so I'm kind of posting two chapter at once each time.


	3. Meetcute

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> this isn't cute at all

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please tell me any plot holes or questions you have, I'm trying to make this the best it can be and would love to discuss anything you like on it.

**Malachi**

He’s got five bracelets left, one ring that absorbs negative energy, and a six-inch cut on his left side just below his ribs that is burning like a _motherfucker._ If he’s ever asked to take on three poltergeists at once again, he’s going to laugh and hang up the fucking phone, and then go on with his life much happier and healthier afterwards.

As it is, though, he needs help, and he knows hospitals will send him straight to the authorities as soon as he’s bandaged up.

The city he’s in is beside a forest, and it’s surprisingly cosmopolitan for it’s location. Sadly, the more rural the area, the less Magic is hunted; here, he’s basically fucked. If he slips up, if someone gets a good enough look at him to see the runes hidden in the designs on his skin, to see them carved into his bracelets, he’s beyond fucked. He’s actually dead.

He spends an hour and a half sneaking through the streets by way of crowd invisibility and alleys, and he has to internalize a string of curses every time he’s bumped into, because it sends sharp waves of pain through his system. His tolerance is much higher than a normal person’s, but it’s still really, really annoying, and something he could easily do without.

It’s by sheer luck that he overhears some religious convention thing outdoors, because a pastor is ranting about the woods, and how they reek of Magic and ancient knowledge. It’s without the slightest bit of hesitation that Mal’s ducking under the tree branches and pushing through the brush in under ten minutes, fully intending on getting deep into them and searching out whatever started those suspicions in the first place.

After a while of walking and pretending he doesn’t feel the slow burning ache, he realizes that the closer he gets to the heart of the forest (well, probably, he’s certainly deep and how far back is this freaking patch of trees, anyways), the more Magic he can sense in the air. He’s been around it long enough to know how it feels, and it’s almost dripping off the leaves he passes, pooling in the dirt and soaking into him. He has no idea was has such incredible power, but whatever it is has been there a long time to permeate the environment so thoroughly. It’s a wonder no one has found it, but there’s still rampant superstition in the city and he’ll bet money he doesn’t have that all of the citizens are too frightened to even attempt to seek it out.

He trips over a root that had certainly not been there when he moved his foot, and he faceplants on soft grass in what has got to be a clearing. Fuck. He’s definitely been noticed or found or whatever by the source of the power, because that is undoubtedly a Magic trip wire, a perimeter spell to alert whenever something crosses that isn’t already native to the forest. Seeing as he can feel blood seeping through his shirt and his body had already ached _before_ faceplanting, he forgoes standing and simply lays there, waiting for whatever was going to come and greet him.

**Jade**

He lives alone.

In the middle of the woods, in the middle of a useless state, in the middle of a country too big to even pretend it knows every citizen.

So why, in all the places in the _galaxy_ , is it _his_ alarm going off?

He’s done so well in hiding, so well in being left well the fuck alone in his house in the woods with his reanimated cat and his messed up body. It’s been more than a hundred years since this house was built, since he’d decided this was his spot, and he’ll be _damned_ if someone’s gonna try and make him move.

Call him an old man, whatever; he doesn’t want any kids on his fucking lawn.

He bathes his hands in flames, cupping a bit in each before he even steps out his front door, because there’s nothing like confronting a possible threat with literal fireballs. For the hell of it, he makes one of them purple, and one of them blue. Might as well make it really, really obvious he’s got power, because maybe if he presents enough of a threat, he’ll be ignored.

Each step he takes toward the source of the alarm—an internal kind of feeling rather than an audible sound, a sort of sense of alert and sudden realization that’s incredibly jarring—is a step closer to what might be an event that changes his life again, and he gets more and more antsy. Mr. Pickles appears by his side, weaving through the planters and the grass, and together the come upon the thing that has the potential to ruin everything.

It’s so anticlimactic he wants to cry.

It’s a boy, and he’s still laying on the ground. He’s frowning up at Jade, and his appearance is literally the last thing Jade would have ever thought of.

He’s Asian, with purple hair that’s just long enough to be mussed in wild loose curls with leaves and twigs snagged in it. There’s piercings all over his face; two in his bottom lip, one through his right eyebrow, and at least three per ear. Tattoos are scattered on his exposed skin, all intricate designs, often floral. His clothes are worn, but they still match the clear aesthetic he has going on, seeing as he’s in black jeans and a black shirt with a graphic that probably belongs to some band Jade’s never heard of, and the flannel shirt that’s tied around his waist in almost funny with how well it completes the look. Jade’s not at all surprised to notice combat boots, either.

He is surprised, though, to notice blood.

It’s hard to tell with how much black the boy has on, but he’d shifted, and it’s stark on his fingers, glossy ruby that means something is very wrong. It’s a natural reaction that has Jade extinguish the flames and drop down to his knees, batting the boy’s hand away and pulling the sleeves of the flannel shirt apart to pull it out of the way.

The boy laughs, and Jade jumps so hard he nearly tips over. Human interaction was never something he was any good at, and the only thing he’s spoken to in all these years has been his cat, and it was maybe once every few months to check if his voice still worked. That was _it._

“You know, you could always just ask me why I’m bleeding, or ask to see.” The boys says, and it’s in a lazy tone. He sounds like he’s not from the state, at least if Jade’s remembering the slightly southern twist most of the residents used to speak with.

Instead of replying (he doesn’t think he can), he looks away from the boy’s face and tries schooling what is surely a very startled expression into blank as he pushes up the boy’s shirt.

Abs.

That’s honestly the first thing he registers, which goes to show what living alone for twenty odd years will due to you. Next, though, is the lesion that spans from the top of the boy’s left hip to just below his rib cage, at a slight angle and shallow enough to mean no serious damage but long enough to mean a lot of blood.

Jade hates blood, it just means pain and sadness and hurt and so many synonyms of wrong that it’d take days for him to list them all, so he’s pulling a pen from his back pocket and drawing runes on the boy’s skin instantly, the first one glowing the second he finishes it, and he keeps drawing until the small row completely a spell that has the boy’s body healing at an abnormally fast pace, the skin knitting back together before their eyes.

He doesn’t look, though, instead mumbling a cleaning spell under his breath and wiping away the blood from his hands and the boy’s skin with one movement. It’s still gross, he still feels like it’s on his skin, gross and wet and wrong. His hands are shaking, now, but he tries to ignore it, trying to keep a lid on his control and trying to keep the Magic going.

The boy lets out a sigh of relief, and Jade can’t help but glance at his expression, which is calm as can be. He even gets a grin, and he can feel the heat rush to his cheeks, which is even more embarrassing than his shaky hands. He realizes, very suddenly, that he is very unprotected and this boy could be a trap. He snaps his fingers, blurting out a spell that knocks the boy out, and does his best to keep from tipping over and passing out himself.


End file.
